From Special Reports
KIEFER – Students in the Kiefer are set to benefit from more than $16,000 in grant money awarded to teachers through the Kiefer Public Schools Foundation.
The announcement of the awards was made earlier in the year by Superintendent Mary Murrell.
“I would like to congratulate our faculty members who took the time and effort involved to apply to the Kiefer Public School Foundation for an educational grant,” Murrell said.
Foundation grants are open to any Kiefer Public Schools teacher and are used to cover supplemental projects and/or supplies used to enhance educational opportunities for students. Applications are made in the fall of the year.
The largest grant went to a group of teachers and administrators who pooled their grant requests to fund a six-foot salad bar, bowls, crocks with lids, cold pans, food pan, and a dressing dispenser set. The salad bar will be operated and maintained by students in the school’s FFA program.
Those pooling their efforts for the salad bar were high school principal Sabrina Shaw, middle school/junior high principal Cory Campbell, and teachers Monica Witte, Shane Francis, Rachel Dodson, Sherie Jones, William Bencoma, Rick Hodges and Shelley Blankenship.
Grants were awarded to the following teachers at the elementary school:
Avery Dykes, Learning Through Dramatic Play; Jamie Sontag, manipulatives and listening center; Taylor Kiddy, learning shapes and colors activities for the carpet; Hannah Sanford, multiple items for learning writing skills;
Jodi Rader, iPad storage and charging station, kinetic sand and miscellaneous learning games; Kimberlee Chalalkee, book stand, word family book set and mini-dry erase boards; Carrie Buck, iPad storage and charging station, ink pads, collage pots and magnetic builders.
Also at the elementary, Judy Carr, Magna tiles for promoting memory development and spatial relationships, journals and privacy partitions, t-shirts, water bottles, notebooks, pencils, and other items to be used as incentives; Jennifer Ashford, math and literary learning games and classroom Accelerated Reader books; Jennifer McGuire, a listening center and classroom AR books; Shannon Mahaffey, Kindle Fire tablets, table cases and a pencil sharpener; Autumn Williams, new subscription to Scholastic magazine, 12 plastic children’s rockers and magnetic learning numbers; Shauna Chalfant, multiple interactive tools, flash cards, a building set and other miscellaneous teaching manipulatives; Lori Taylor, a classroom thesaurus, Top 6 readers get Wal-Mart gift cards, and Scholastic books earned by points; Tammie Atkinson, multiple math posters, a geometry kit, and playground equipment, such as soccer balls, footballs and basketballs; and Crystal Hughes, organizational tools, a standing workstation with baskets, a wire stackable letter rack and pencil clips.
Other grants at the elementary school were awarded to Terri Folsom for multiple science learning games; Amber Dangott, 100 classroom AR books and 10 individual whiteboards; Robyn Kiddy, Envision math curriculum, student worksheets and a Smart Board technology package; Rachel Matheney, sight word reader kits and a science specimen sorting center; Juan Castillo, Frisbees, foam footballs, dodgeballs and basketballs; Daen Donnell, multiple reading games, flashcards, stickers and pencils for incentives, indoor/outdoor recess supplies (topple tubes, hula hoops, balls); Debbie Whitchurch, Softee hockey set and equipment cart; and Kris Byars, hand bell set, bass tube, xylophone, song books and rhythm flash cards.
At the middle school and junior high, Kiefer’s Reba White received funding a one-year subscription to flocabulary.com and two classroom book sets; Janet Neal, privacy dividers and classroom headphones; Taylor Youngblood Johnson, a classroom set of books; Bonnie Slate, classroom headphones and a classroom set of TI-30XS calculators; Holly Hannon, an iPad Mini, iPad screen protector and iPad case;
At the high school, Cheyenne Castillo was awarded a grant for Spanish curriculum books, printable worksheets and coaching books; Lorrie Quinnelly, a plaque, gift cards, and cash prizes for essay contest winners; and Rob Brown and Trena Thompson, color guard contest entry fees, props and costumes.
